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Tuesday, 24 January 2012

Battle of the Bands - for Ghana

For
the 21 year old president of Concordia University’s Hillel, participating in the
annual “alternative spring break” last year was a life changing experience.
This is why Evara David and her colleagues are pushing ahead with an upcoming
Battle of the Bands fundraiser to ensure that these type of programs continue.

The Battle of the Bands will take place on
Thursday, February 2 (8:30 p.m.) at Club Lambi (4465 Boulevard Saint-Laurent
corner Mont Royal) in Montreal. Hillel Concordia is organizing the event. All
proceeds will go towards purchasing building materials for a Hillel envoy to bring
to Ghana. Four bands (The Spitfire Nines, the Smokin’ Darts, the Rocket Alarms
and Ill City Lights) will battle it out on stage, each playing a set of
originals plus an appropriate cover!

Assaf Goldberg's band

Groups
like New York-based American Jewish World Service (AJWS) and Jewish Funds for
Justice (JFJ) coordinate these “alternativespring breaks,”a one-week to
10-day international service-learning programs for university students.
Participants promote social change in the developing world by volunteering with
a grassroots partners, and explore the relationship between social justice,
service and Judaism.

Last
year, Hillel Montreal sent a few envoys to Miami, Nicaragua andyes the poor areas of Los Angeles. “On each
trip the candidates worked with different grassroots organizations - some
Jewish and others not- such as soup kitchens and urban farms,” David explained.
“This year, one of the trips will be going to Ghana! While each participant is
responsible for paying their own way, albeit subsidized, they still have to
raise money to buy building materials. This is where our Battle of the Bands
come in.”

David
says that Concordia has provided them with a budget, enabling all proceeds from
the ticket sales and potentially a bake sale on site to go directly towards the
materials that will be needed to build schools in Ghana by the Hillel
volunteers over spring break.

“I
can speak on a personal experience with regard to the benefits of these trips,”
said David, who was part of the LA entourage.” For one, I think we can all
agree on the value of helping all of mankind, especially in these tumultuous
times. Secondly, visiting places like the infamous skid row of LA was deeply
emotional. When you take a kid, like myself, who has spent her entire life in
the predominantly Jewish suburb of Côte Saint-Luc and put them in one of the
most impoverished areas in the United States, it can be quite the realization.
Growing up in a bubble, which we often do in the Jewish community, can allow us
to take our good fortune for granted. Sure, we say ‘we're fortunate,’ but most
of us truly don't understand what it means to be fortunate because we've never
seen unfortunate to this extent. “

David
notes that L.A has a homeless population of around 80,000. “What we noticed was
that government intervention was minimal and upsetting, but we witnessed real
life miracles that were manifesting within these grassroots organizations,” she
says. “We spent the day in a totally self sustaining homeless shelter,
complete with doctors and legal aids that managed to turn out thousands of
meals a day and yet run by a handful of people. We saw what a community, along
with donations and good organization can achieve. What I witnessed on that trip
will always be seared into my memory, the poverty was overwhelming but the hope
and determination was astonishing and truly beautiful.

“We
can't always look at problems as relating to a specific minority, but rather as
a human problem. We are Jews, but we are also human beings and as such we
should help others. It's important to watch out for these people in your
community and it’s a beautiful thing to have a strong community. However, this
is the next generation of Jewish leaders and we need to be aware of problems
facing all of humanity. My experience on skid row in South L.A was life
changing. It changed me as a person and as a Jew. These are lessons that anyone
can benefit from.”

Assaf
Goldberg,the vice-president of
advocacyfor HillelConcordia,believes that the envoys who go to Ghana will come back feeling very
much the same way as David did. He
notes that McGill Hillel is also part of the program.